Cape paramedic concealed sex offender status

A paramedic from Sandwich dodged unemployment and losing his professional license for five months despite pleading guilty to child pornography charges and being barred from working in any job that brought him into regular contact with minors.

By STEVE DOANE

capecodtimes.com

By STEVE DOANE

Posted Feb. 6, 2013 at 2:00 AM

By STEVE DOANE

Posted Feb. 6, 2013 at 2:00 AM

TIMELINE

June 5, 2009: State police execute search warrant at the Sandwich home of paramedic Wesley J. Anderson.

June 5, 2009: State police execute search warrant at the Sandwich home of paramedic Wesley J. Anderson.

Feb. 18, 2011: Barnstable County grand jury indicts Anderson on 58 counts of possession of child pornography. He is arraigned a month later and released on personal recognizance.

Aug. 3, 2012: Anderson pleads guilty to all counts and is sentenced to five years of probation and ordered, among other things, not to be employed in a job that includes regular contact with children. He is required to alert the state Department of Public Health of his conviction but does not.

Nov. 13, 2012: Anderson's attorney files a motion to amend the employment condition of his probation.

Nov. 27, 2012: Anderson's attorney argues the motion in Barnstable Superior Court. No action taken by Judge Robert C. Rufo.

Dec. 18, 2012: The Times contacts the DPH about Anderson's paramedic license status.

Dec. 19, 2012: DPH spokeswoman tells the Times the department is "looking into" the case.

Jan. 3, 2013: Anderson's paramedic license is suspended.

Jan. 8, 2013: Anderson's attorney asks the court to take a scheduled hearing off the docket. Case has not been rescheduled.

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A paramedic from Sandwich dodged unemployment and losing his professional license for five months despite pleading guilty to child pornography charges and being barred from working in any job that brought him into regular contact with minors.

Wesley J. Anderson, 24, of Widow Coombs Walk, pleaded guilty Aug. 3 in Barnstable Superior Court to 58 counts of possession of child pornography. He was sentenced to five years of probation and ordered "not to be employed in any position that places him in contact with minor children on a regular basis."

Under Massachusetts regulations, emergency medical personnel must notify the state within five days of any criminal conviction.

But Anderson notified neither the state nor his employer, according to Department of Public Health spokeswoman Anne Roach. The state was unaware of his conviction until the Times made inquiries, she said in an email.

Instead, Anderson continued to work as a paramedic, according to a motion and accompanying affidavit filed by his attorney, Thomas A. Brant, in November in Barnstable Superior Court. The motion sought to change the conditions of Anderson's probation so he could renew his paramedic license. The state Office of Emergency Medical Services would refuse to renew the license so long as Anderson was barred from working with children, according to the affidavit.

In his appeal before the court Nov. 27, Brant argued that Anderson downloaded the illegal material before he turned 17 and wasn't involved in its creation. He also has been successful in his court-ordered counseling and has shown no signs that he'd pose a threat while on the job, the attorney said.

"He's not a danger to anyone," Brant said in an interview with the Times in early December.

The attorney later confirmed that Anderson had been working as a paramedic with a private ambulance contractor, but would not specify which company except to say it was not on Cape Cod.

The Times was unable to confirm his employer but contacted six private ambulance contractors within 50 miles of the Cape. Five said Anderson had not worked for them. One did not return messages.

Anderson has declined to talk to the Times.

The DPH began looking into Anderson's case following questions from the Times in December, according to Roach. The department requested Anderson's court records and finally suspended his license Jan. 3. The department also has taken action to permanently revoke Anderson's license, according to Roach.

The charges against Anderson were the result of a Massachusetts State Police child pornography investigation that culminated in the June 2009 search of his Sandwich home.

He was indicted in Barnstable Superior Court on Feb. 18, 2011, and arraigned a month later. He was released on personal recognizance, according to court records.

Cape and Islands First Assistant District Attorney Brian Glenny would not discuss specifics of the case.

The Times filed a public record request Nov. 30 for the state police report, but it has not been returned and a state police spokesman has said only that the request is still pending.

Each depiction of child pornography on a suspect's computer can warrant a separate charge. It is unknown how many images investigators found on Anderson's computer, but he pleaded guilty to 58 charges.

Anderson was sentenced to five years of probation on each count to be served concurrently. He was ordered to attend sexual-abuse-perpetrator counseling until discharged by the therapist, to have no unsupervised contact with minor children and to remain on a GPS bracelet.

The condition that he not have regular contact with minors is monitored by probation, and as of last week, the department "had no information ... that indicates the probationer has been noncompliant," spokeswoman Coria Holland wrote in an email.

Anderson is registered as a sex offender, as required under state law. The three sex offender levels are based on a defendant's risk of reoffending after a conviction. A Level 1 offender is been determined to be a low risk, while a Level 3 is judged to be high risk.

The Times was unable to confirm Anderson's classification because of privacy restrictions set by the Massachusetts Sex Offender Registry Board. In a December interview, Brant said his client was a Level 2, but he has since not returned multiple calls and messages. The Sandwich Police Department has Anderson listed as a Level 1 offender.

Under the Code of Massachusetts Regulations, emergency first responders are supposed to file a written report with DPH within five days after being convicted of a crime other than a minor traffic violation. From there, the Office of Emergency Medical Services is supposed to submit a Criminal Offender Record Information request to the state Criminal History Systems Board.

After receiving that report, the Office of Emergency Medical Services is supposed to review it and make a recommendation to its management team. The team can suspend, revoke or refuse to renew a license, and the applicant can appeal any action.

Anderson did not do that. Instead, Brant filed the motion in Barnstable Superior Court on Nov. 13 seeking to amend the conditions of Anderson's sentence so he could renew his paramedic license.